Another round of house guests this month? Kids getting underfoot? Looking to try something new in town?

Here’s a fun outdoor activity to consider if you’re looking to see Baltimore from another vantage point: Kayak around the Inner Harbor on a summer Sunday morning or afternoon. Get some exercise and enjoy some cooler breezes while taking in what our harbor has to offer. Plus, you can learn why and how our harbor is finally getting cleaned up.

The tours leave at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. from the Maryland Science Center’s Water Taxi landing. Each tour accommodates up to 15 people. Kayakers must be at least 13 years old. Register here and check out the FAQs for the ins and outs on making this a special day on the harbor.

Casey Merbler, a Health Harbor Initiative project manager at the Waterfront Partnership, said kayaking tour tickets are still available. “The best part of the kayak tour is that the Recreation and Parks experts know the Inner Harbor so well and they share interesting information about the floating wetlands, main attractions and wildlife found right in our harbor,” she said.

You don’t need to be a proficient swimmer to enjoy the kayaking tour, which this leads us to the question that everyone has about the Inner Harbor’s water quality: Is it safe to boat in the harbor? Yes. Swimming, not yet.

As we’ve reported, Baltimore’s Inner Harbor is finally on its way to becoming swimmable and fishable in the near future. Today, the harbor is only safe to swim in about half the time — and that’s actually an improvement. Because our city and state government administrations neglected to fix some seriously old, and poorly designed, sewage and stormwater infrastructure for decades, our waterways are not safe to swim in, especially after rain storms.

Learn about Baltimore’s pipes and partnerships and why the recently approved $430 million “Headworks” project is a positive sign, and also a big deal for Charm City. Helping with some mack-daddy bills, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced today that Baltimore is one of only 12 proposed project locations invited to apply for a $200 million, lower-cost loan to help fix our sewage and stormwater infrastructure. That’s the kind of news that Baltimore needs.

Greenlaurel’s note 7/27/17: We had to share readers Margot and Kate’s kayaking adventure below. See what you’re missing!

Laurel writes the environmental GreenLaurel column every other Thursday in the Baltimore Fishbowl. A graduate of UVA's MBA program, she spends her time with her family and making "all things green" interesting.